The Second Chance
by Just Gallant Genius
Summary: A collection of stories about the galaxy after the end of the Reaper War. But it is shaping up to be centered around a certain plot. MAY OR MAY NOT BE UPDATED LATER ON.


**Characters**

 **Selina T'Lanni**

Age: 450 years

Race: Asari

Occupation: Medic on board of Freighter Wikiwiki

Biography:

The youngest daughter of a powerful and rich Asari clan T'Lanni, Selina was always an outsider and at odds with most of the family. The only people she was close to were her mother and her sister, Alina T'Lanni. Having no interest in politics or power play, she pursued academic and altruistic interests eventually settling on her occupation as a medical professional. Being a strong believer in constant self-improvement she utilized Asari's vast lifespan to enhance her knowledge in technology, science, arts & crafts. She spent her late maiden and early matron years in the humanitarian groups working in Terminus Systems hospitals. Firsthand witnessing of death, suffering and injustice as well as constant fear for life & safety negatively impacted her mental health & jaded her world view. While no less committed to her mission of improving the lives of the disadvantaged, she started to withdraw from the world and to cope with stress and depression with alcohol and drugs. During this time, one of her night-stands have resulted in her giving birth to a daughter whom she named Hera. Her new family gave her some sense of stability and meaning which caused her to sober up but ultimately she reverted back to drug abuse when Hera became self-sufficient enough. Selina managed to remain a high-functioning addict in terms of work but not in terms of social life. Only her close family and friends remained in touch with her whereas colleagues shunned her and tolerated due to never failing professionalism.

During the Reaper invasion she fell under the effects of indoctrination and was used as part of Reaper slave labor to repurpose other organics for their purpose. One of those victims was Selina's daughter Hera who was turned into a Banshee. Selina could not stop herself from doing this and by the time the war was over that knowledge the act itself and deformed Hera's death in a skirmish left here with PTSD and severe psychosis during which she cut out her left eye. Despite the seriousness of her condition, she went in remission within three years, as psychotic episodes became more rare and her traumatic flashbacks became manageable. With all of her family dead, except her sister who was disowned by her mother, she inherited the entirety of T'Lanni fortune. Selina spent some of the time working as a volunteer in a hospital on Citadel until she came across captain of a freighter Wikiwiki named Sha Cham who offered her a job as a ship medic, which she accepted.

 **Political Entities**

 **Asari Republics**

After the Reaper War the Asari have started immediate reconstruction efforts both within and outside Asari space. Councilor Tevos took a proactive role in Citadel Council by proposing and pushing through multiple cooperation agreements between all galactic races. She, along with councilors Valern, Sparatus and newly appointed human councilor Astrid von Hodenberg, have extended the offer to all the races of the galaxy to become the client council entities in order to build proper diplomatic relations, an offer that was accepted by everyone.

Unfortunately, as the foreign relation politics of the Asari Republics bloom, the bottled up internal conflicts have started to take shape. A Reformist Party founded by Matriarch Benezia and Matriarch Aethyta has grown exponentially as their platform of limiting the matriarchs' power, investing in education of youth, supporting the poor and restoring the reproduction rights became extremely relevant in the face of the current struggles. The reproduction rights issue is especially relevant as the government has almost completely banned reproduction between two Asaris due to increasing rate of genetic illnesses. The government to this date has offered no solutions and the lower classes who cannot afford to go outside their planets and procreate have started to form their own organizations: from peaceful rights & support groups to resistance & terrorist cells.

Human Systems Alliance

Due to being the primary target of the Reapers, the Human Systems Alliance has suffered the most severe blow, Batarian Hegemony excluded. Humans have effectively lost all their colonies and the population of Earth was reduced from 11 billion to 2.5 billion. Because of the remaining military and huge involvement in the war effort, the humans have retained their place on the council. The seat was taken by Astrid von Hodenberg, the former minister of foreign affairs of the European Union, who built relations with not only the Earth nations, but also the colonies and individual states of Council space races. While in the pre-war times it was considered to be an extra effort and largely a pointless exercise, her experience is now invaluable to the political entity that has lost almost all of its intragalactic political experts.

The humans are largely focusing on restoration efforts and their involvement in the Citadel Council revolves directly and indirectly around getting as much support as possible. However, the relationships between humans and various galactic races are at their all-time high due to humans' heroism in the war against and the Reapers and due to formation of multiple communities of various species across the Earth. These communities include the commune of Salarians in the north-eastern Brazil, a commune of Turians in eastern coast of United North American States, a commune of Asari in Japan and New Zealand as well as Geth cells in northern Russia and Scandinavia.

 **Prologue**

In 2186 Commander Shepard launched the Crucible and ended the Reaper threat. The ships that were decimating the fleets and planets were helping with the reconstruction for a while until they started slowly disappearing. Along with that, the few existing AIs became more enhanced as they gained a more nuanced understanding of organic races while some of the children of every species were born with cybernetic enhancements, the purpose of which still remain a mystery. Nobody knew what happened to Shepard, but they universally agreed theory is that the somehow she directed Reapers to repair the Mass Relay networks and then disappear once again.

With the threat of an imminent destruction gone inhabitants of the galaxy focused on not only rebuilding but also on settling old grievances and rushing into new conflicts. The Citadel Council provided associative membership to all of the spacefaring species of the galaxy and nobody declined this offer. However, the Reaper War allowed the old wounds to open and the most established powers suffered the most from it. Salarian Union split in two parts and that cost them a seat on a council while Asari Republics entered a period of major political crisis between the two rapidly growing political factions that have vastly different ideas on where the Asari should be headed. The fall of the old gave the rise to the new. Vol Protectorate grew increasingly independent and self-sufficient to the point of securing Salarian seat on the council. Geth-Quarian Synergy became a rapidly developing state, establishing cities and trade routes within months. In the less civilized regions of the Milky Way the pirates grew bolder, the warlords became more prominent, secret organizations got revived, some wronged people prepared for revenge and a vast amount of unexplored regions became accessible.

These are stories about the light in the dark and about the flicker of hope in the most desperate times and how through all of this people can pull through. These are stories of the people who survived, who survive and who manage to live through all of it.


End file.
